Ever switch between your investor hat and your philanthropist hat?
FlexUp offers a third option – one where you can support meaningful projects and, if they succeed, also earn returns. For wealthy individuals and organizations who care about both impact and sustainability, FlexUp blends giving and investing into a single, transparent model.
With FlexUp, you don’t have to choose between doing good and doing well. You can do both—on your terms.
How the FlexUp Model Reimagines Purposeful Capital
Imagine you’re a wealthy individual who wants to change the world. On some days, you feel like a philanthropist: you want to help people, regenerate ecosystems, fund meaningful work. On other days, you put your investor hat on. You want returns, sustainability, and smart allocation of capital. And like many others, you may feel you have to pick a lane: either give money with no expectation of return or invest with a focus on profit.
But what if that choice was a false dilemma?
The False Divide Between Investing and Donating
In traditional finance, the distinction is rigid. Donations are altruistic. Investments are capitalistic. The former may bring emotional satisfaction, but no financial return. The latter demands profitability, often at the cost of social or environmental depth.
This split isn’t just artificial – it’s inefficient. It forces capital to take sides when real-world impact often thrives in the grey areas. And that’s exactly the kind of barrier the FlexUp model is designed to remove.
A Model Built on Non-Discrimination
At the heart of FlexUp is a principle that challenges the foundation of our economic systems: non-discrimination. In FlexUp, there is no structural distinction between an investor and an entrepreneur, between capital and labour, between donor and investor. Everyone is treated as a contributor. Everyone operates under the same framework. Everyone earns based on contribution and risk.
This is made possible through FlexUp’s unique common remuneration system, where every participant can choose how to split their earnings between three risk levels:
- Firm: guaranteed monthly payment, low risk, low return.
- Flex: conditional monthly payment, medium risk, variable return.
- Equity: high risk, high potential return, representing shares in future profits and decision-making power.
This structure lets each contributor, whether they bring cash, labour, or services, decide for themselves how much risk they’re willing to take – and be rewarded accordingly.
A Real-World Example: Regenerating a Farmland in Southern France
Let’s bring this to life with a real case: the DoMazy Community (see www.domazy.fr).
In the south of France, a 100-hectare farmland is transitioning into a new chapter. The original owner is retiring. Instead of selling it off to the highest bidder, the vision is to turn it into a living ecosystem of small farms, where entrepreneurs each build their own regenerative agricultural businesses.
Each entrepreneur receives their own parcel of land and starts a self-owned venture. But they’re not alone. They’re part of a financially and socially connected community, where mutual aid and solidarity are embedded into the project design.
Here’s how FlexUp enables it to happen.
The Role of the Investor
Benefactors – let’s simply call them investors, since FlexUp removes the artificial line – step in. They believe in the vision and are ready to commit funds. But instead of choosing between donating with no strings attached or investing with hard demands, they enter the FlexUp system as contributors, just like the entrepreneurs.
Their funds are used strategically to fund the community, which in turn will fund each project, as follows:
- To fund shared housing and food: living expenses (food and accommodation) are provided by the community, to create a supportive, low-cost environment for its members (entrepreneurs and other people the community sustains),
- To cover basic needs: Each entrepreneur receives a firm remuneration of 300~600 euros per month.
- To pay essential project costs: Anything needed to get the farms (or other types of projects) operational is transparently tracked and funded.
What the investor does not do is overextend capital toward high-fixed salaries or high-risk operations. Their exposure is limited, intentional, and transparent.
The Entrepreneur’s Journey
Each entrepreneur negotiates their target salary – let’s say around 1,500 to 3,000 euros per month, depending on their level of expertise and the type of project they propose. But instead of demanding it all upfront, they split it into tiers:
- 20% Firm: 300~600 €, which is paid monthly by the community, no matter what,
- 30% Flex: 450~900 €, which is paid only if their project generates enough revenue,
- 50% Equity: 750–1500 €, issued as credits and tokens, which give them a claim on future profits and voting rights in their projects
This lets each entrepreneur take a calculated level of risk – enough to stay motivated, but not so much as to break under pressure. If the project does well, they benefit. If it doesn’t, they’ve still had housing, food, and a modest income while building something real.
And for the investor: if the project does well, they get a return on investment, which they can reinvest in the community, or use to start other similar communities. If the project does not, well … they’ve helped someone live decently and gain valuable entrepreneurial experience, making them stronger and ready for a new venture.
Shared Rules, Zero Ambiguity
Here’s where FlexUp really shines.
All participants – the investor, the entrepreneurs, other types of contributors – are bound by the FlexUp Charter, a standardized and robust contractual framework that outlines:
- How cash is managed
- How decisions are made
- How profits are distributed
- How transparency is ensured
There’s no need to reinvent the wheel with every deal. The Charter applies worldwide, and it integrates directly with the FlexUp app, which handles:
- Contract generation and signatures
- Cash flow visibility for all associates
- Token tracking, showing each participant’s equity and voting rights
- Remuneration tracking, down to each euro of base, flexible, and equity payment
This means the investor knows exactly how their funds are used. The entrepreneurs know exactly what they’re earning. And trust is built not through promises, but through a solid contractual framework, real-time data and a shared governance system.
A Platform for Economic Regeneration
FlexUp is more than a tool – it’s a new economic philosophy. It’s based on the belief that collaboration works better when everyone is treated equitably – not equal remuneration, but fair remuneration based on contribution and risk – when risk and reward are balanced fairly, and when complexity is replaced with clarity.
In the old world, donors and investors had to choose: impact or return. In the FlexUp world, they can aim for both – and let each contributor decide how much they lean into one or the other.
And that’s what makes FlexUp revolutionary.
A Quiet Revolution in How We Fund the Future
Projects like the DoMazy Community in southern France are already showing what’s possible when we remove outdated walls between roles. The farmer, the funder, the advisor – they’re all just contributors to a shared mission. Everyone is accountable. Everyone is empowered.
“The FlexUp model helped us stop negotiating and start building.”
That’s what one entrepreneur told us. And that’s the goal: to free people from friction so they can focus on the work that matters.
Want to support a project you believe in?
You don’t need to choose between being a donor or an investor. You can be both. Or neither. You can simply be a contributor – someone who puts in what they can, takes out what’s fair, and shares the journey transparently.
The FlexUp platform makes this real
With FlexUp, everything is tracked and formalized:
- Contribution contracts
- Payment structures
- Live dashboards showing cash, commitments, and tokens
- Clear, standardized rules via the FlexUp Charter
It’s like having a financial operating system designed for collaboration, not competition.
If you're an entrepreneur: you can finally focus on your mission, knowing your collaborators – investors, teammates, advisors – are aligned with you.
If you're a philanthropist of an investor – you don’t have to pick anymore – you can channel your capital into meaningful ventures with clarity, control, and a model that rewards commitment and risk, not status or position.
Ready to step into the new economy?
Explore the FlexUp ecosystem. Connect with projects. Contribute where it matters. And build a future where purpose and performance go hand in hand.
Read more
- DoMazy Community website (www.domazy.org)
- Questions & Answers
- Other articles from our: Blog
Invest or Donate? Why not do both?